In advanced civilizations the period loosely called Alexandrian is usually associated with flexible morals, perfunctory religion, populist standards and cosmopolitan tastes, feminism, exotic cults, and the rapid turnover of high and low fads—in short, a falling away (which is all that decadence means) from the strictness of traditional rules, embodied in character and inforced from within. — Jacques Barzun

Archive for the ‘Politics’ Category

I recently joined a group of scholars and writers for Donald Trump; reasons here. Many other newspapers have picked up the article in the days since it first appeared in the Washington Post. I have been getting lots of email ever since, much of it expressing gratitude for saying things that few others have been saying; some of it hostile (my favorite calls me an “idiot professor”); and some of it disagreeing but thanking me for trying to return political discourse to the country’s direction rather than personal insults. I’ve done several interviews and have several more scheduled. Monday morning I’m slated to appear on the Laura Ingraham show. Evidently this is my fifteen minutes of fame.

Laura Kipnis, a Professor of Film Studies at Northwestern University who endured an extensive Title IX investigation at her own university for writing an article, gave the keynote address at a conference on Theorizing Consent last evening at the University of Texas at Austin. The Title IX investigations sweeping across U.S. campuses are more pervasive than most people on campus realize, and the range of things for which one can be investigated is startlingly broad. Kipnis described them as part of a “secret war against the professoriate.” But students are the ones chiefly caught in the crossfire.

A lack of information: Most targets of investigation are not told who is accusing them or what the charges are. They are called in to an office for a meeting without any information and thus without any opportunity to prepare. The investigating official then asks a series of vague questions, conducting a fishing expedition to try to get the accused to say something that might be damaging in light of the undisclosed charges. Many never receive any charges in writing.

Improvised procedures: It is up to each university to establish its own procedures for investigating complaints. Those procedures are evolving rapidly, and often change at the whim of the investigating official. Will you have an opportunity to see charges in writing? Bring an attorney to a hearing? Have a hearing? Get to say anything in your defense? Introduce any witnesses? Who knows? It’s up to the whims of the Title IX officer.

Improvised standards: What does Title IX require? What does it prohibit? The law itself is vague, and each investigating official makes up criteria for applying it on the fly. John Locke said that freedom under government is to have settled, known law, fairly administered by an known and impartial judge, and to be free to act where the law is silent. Under Title IX as currently applied, students and faculty members face changing and largely unknown rules, administered haphazardly and often discriminatorily by a shadowy bureaucracy with its own vested interests, across a vast and protean range of their lives. If you think the law applies only to allegations of rape on campus, think again. It has been applied not only to writing an article but to uncomfortable eye contact, criticism of ex-girlfriends, and the balance of readings on course syllabi. (Better watch those bibliographies!) People have lost their jobs for having dated someone who later became an adult student at the university. They have been found guilty for violating codes of conduct that were not yet in effect when the conduct took place. They have been expelled for things done to them while they were unconscious.

Absurd, subjective methodologies: One Title IX investigator said that she purposely summoned people under investigation to her office without giving them any information about the nature of the complaint against them so that she could see the look on their faces when they heard the allegations. Watching their faces told her all she needed to know, she was convinced, about guilt or innocence.

Gag orders: Those under investigation are routinely ordered not to tell anyone about being under investigation, on pain of facing a further charge of retaliation—even if they refrain from naming their accuser (whose name they might not be told in any event). Even saying “I’m no longer under investigation!” after being exonerated can be enough to trigger a further investigation.

Retroactive withdrawal of consent: One of the most chilling features of Title IX investigations is the ability of the complainant to withdraw consent retroactively. Many charges are brought months or even years after the fact against someone who thought everything that had happened was fully consensual. But someone can be penalized—sanctioned, fired, expelled, etc.—for conduct that someone later decides to have been against her consent, even if she gave no indication of that at the time and in fact gave enthusiastic expressions of consent.

Third-party complaints: Many complaints are brought not by the alleged victim but by someone else—a friend, a social justice warrior, or a Title IX official—even though the supposed victim denies being a victim and insists that she consented to everything that took place.

Qui bono? Whose interests are being served by this inquisition? Those of the Title IX investigators, obviously, who see their power and their bureaucratic dominions grow, but also the administration more broadly. Vague, shifting, and arbitrary standards give administrators enormous leverage over students and faculty.

Paranoia: The result is a campus climate of paranoia. Almost anything you do or say could be the basis for a Title IX investigation.

The industry that Title IX has spawned includes not only the enforcement bureaucracy but an education and training bureaucracy that shows just as little interest in the truth. They ignore the link between sexual misconduct and binge drinking on campus, even though everyone involved knows that alcohol plays a large role in the hookup culture, because they insist that doing so constitutes blaming the victim. They similarly resist self-defense or assertiveness training—which are known to work—in favor of methodologies that appear to make no difference and may even make the problem worse. They insist on statistics—1 in five women are sexually assaulted while in college, only 2% of rape allegations are untrue—which have little basis and which in fact are almost certainly false.

The 2% number, Kipnis pointed out, shows how little interest Title IX advocates have in the facts. It comes from Susan Brownmiller’s Against Our Will. She did no statistical analysis herself, but cited a speech given by a New York judge. He got the number from a study done by a police squad, with no statistical training, in one precinct in New York City! The FBI puts the number of false rape reports at 8% of those brought to the police. Among complaints of rape, sexual assault, sexual misconduct, unwelcome hand-holding, inappropriate eye movements, publications causing discomfort, and the like brought before campus tribunals, by third parties as well as alleged victims, the percentage of baseless complaints is undoubtedly far higher.

As for the famed one in five number, the Bureau of Justice Statistics estimates that the incidence of sexual assault among college women is 6.1 in 1,000.

Kipnis’s main theme was that the current movement on campus places no responsibility whatever on potential victims, undermining their sense of agency instead of encouraging them to stand up for themselves and say no. The assumption tends to be that men are agents, but women aren’t. Men do things; women have things done to them. That assumption is sexist. It’s wrong. And it’s hard to imagine an assumption more damaging to women.

President Obama has been on a losing streak in the international arena, claiming as victories against Russia, Iran, and Syria what any sensible observer would see as major defeats. Yet he seems to run rings around Congressional Republicans, who have approved a budget deal that funds Planned Parenthood, expanded admission of refugees, and even the Office Of Civil Rights’ assault on due process—not to mention the President’s war on the suburbs, also known as the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule. What’s going on? If Putin, Assad, and the mullahs have his number, why is the Congressional majority incapable of winning even minor battles?

I want to suggest an explanation. Many people have noted Obama’s strange foreign policy: punish your friends and reward your enemies. Take that as a strategy for playing iterated prisoners’ dilemmas, and the above results start to make sense. A common and highly successful strategy for iterated prisoners’ dilemmas is Tit-for-Tat: start by cooperating, and then do what the other player did on the last turn. Obama’s strategy is basically the reverse of that: start by cooperating, and then do the opposite of what the other player did on the last turn.

See what happens if we play Obama against Tit-for-Tat (where C means cooperate, and D means defect):

Turn

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Obama

C

D

D

C

C

D

D

C

C

D

Tit-for-Tat

C

C

D

D

C

C

D

D

C

C

This four-round cycle continues. If we have a stable payoff matrix like this,

Cooperate

Defect

Cooperate

3, 3

0, 5

Defect

5, 0

1, 1

then Obama and Tit-for-Tat each average 2.25 points per turn—not terrible, but worse than they could have done by cooperating consistently.

The more forgiving the opposing strategy is, the better Obama does, and the worse the opponent does. Here’s Obama vs. Tit-for-Two-Tats:

Turn

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Obama

C

D

D

D

C

C

D

D

D

C

Tit-for-Two-Tats

C

C

C

D

D

C

C

C

D

D

Here there is a five-round cycle. Obama averages 2.8 per turn, while Tit-for-Two-Tats averages 1.8. Tit-for-Three-Tats would do even worse, producing a six-round cycle that yielded it an average of 1.5 per turn. (Obama meanwhile would earn almost 3.2 per turns.) The extreme case, a strategy that always cooperates, would after the first turn get no points at all, while Obama would get 5 every time.

Moral for Republicans: the more cooperative and forgiving you are, the better Obama does, and the worse you do.

Now see what happens if Obama goes up against a tough guy who always defects. Call that strategy Putin. It’s a disaster for Obama:

Turn

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Obama

C

C

C

C

C

C

C

C

C

C

Putin

D

D

D

D

D

D

D

D

D

D

Putin gets 5 every time, and Obama gets nothing. Something similar happens if Obama goes up against a strategy that cooperates until the opponent defects, after which it invariably defects. (Fool me once….) Obama defects in the second round, and the opponent retaliates by defecting ever after—while Obama in response keeps trying to cooperate, in effect trying to atone for his earlier sin.

Moral for Obama: Apology tours, red lines, executive agreements, treaties, etc., etc., don’t work against an implacable foe. And the world is full of them.

Today we move on to the economy and the role of government. Sparks are sure to fly.

6. “A few government and U.S. history textbooks suffer from an uncritical celebration of the free enterprise system, both by ignoring legitimate problems created by capitalism and failing to include coverage of government’s role in U.S. economic system.”

(a) Here, according to the Texas Freedom Network, are the kinds of outrageous remarks the textbooks under consideration make about free enterprise:

The atmosphere of a free market, as well as a free society that encourages the exchange of ideas, can and often does lead to innovation and scientific and technological discoveries. All these conditions promote growth in the economy and often improve the quality of everyday life.

The proper role of government in economic affairs should be restricted to functions intended to promote and protect the free play of competition and the operation of the laws of supply and demand. True laissez-faire capitalism has never in fact operated in this country, yet it has a profound effect on the structure of the nation’s economic system, which can be described as laissez-faire capitalism with limited government involvement.

The Network admits that the free enterprise system has led to great material and intellectual progress. But they want some discussion of its disadvantages and limitations.

… the text’s treatment of the free enterprise system is unbalanced and asymmetrical because the text provides little mention of the possible limits and disadvantages of a free enterprise and laissez- faire system. Students are given little awareness that critics of a laissez-faire system, both in the U.S. today and the past, have argued that an unfettered market can and has occasionally led to economic insecurity and inequality, unfair pay and unsafe labor conditions for many employees.

Identifying free enterprise and laissez-faire, as the Network and arguably the latter text do, is a mistake. The American market has not been “unfettered” anytime in the past century, and probably since the nation’s founding. In any case, it’s hard to evaluate this complaint without seeing the larger context in the texts in question. I’m inclined to count the complaint against the first text as bogus. A free market and free exchange of ideas do bring great benefits, and there’s no need for a “however.” The quote from the second text sounds as if it’s an endorsement of a libertarian approach to economic affairs, but I’m guessing that in context it’s clear that this is the proper role of government according to advocates of laissez-faire capitalism. I’ll hesitantly call this debatable.

(b) Another text mentions complaints about the Gilded Age, but responds,

The dizzying array of things to do and buy convinced the growing middle class that modern America was in a true golden age.”[…] [sic] The application of scientific discoveries and technological innovations by the free enterprise system improved the standard of living in the United States. Driven by entrepreneurs, American businesses were able to create products and services that made daily life easier and more fun for many people. Mass produced materials and products lowered the prices of many goods, enabling ordinary Americans to purchase items that previously had been out of reach.

The Network denounces this treatment, saying,

nineteenth-century free- market capitalism went hand in hand with governmental suppression of Native ownership over vast swaths of fertile land, leading to that land’s transformation (first) into public property and (second) into private property protected by law. Without governmental action, that transformation would not have happened. Second, nobody during the age of early industrialization disputed the importance of active governmental support for “internal improvements” that were beyond private means. And finally, any comprehensive discussion of the history of free-market capitalism in this country should note that the great driving commodity of the pre-Civil War economy was cotton, produced by slave labor on an enormous scale.

To call this complaint bogus is kind; it is ridiculous. The Gilded Age is the period, roughly, 1870-1900, in which the fruits of the Second Industrial Revolution spread to a growing middle class. It was the era in which department stores, music halls, theaters, large consumer products companies, mass circulation newspapers and magazines, team sports, and other accoutrements of an urbane middle-class lifestyle were born. The wealth that had concentrated earlier in the century as a result of the First Industrial Revolution began to spread throughout a substantial portion of society.

During this era, yes, the government fought wars against tribes in the West, swindled them out of large areas of land, confined them to reservations, etc. But this had little to do with the key developments of the Second Industrial Revolution or the rise of the middle-class. So, it’s hard to see how it’s relevant to the topic at hand. The closing decades of the nineteenth century were NOT “the age of early industrialization,” so it’s hard to see how the building of roads and canals earlier in the century is particularly relevant either. The Network wants the book to make a “They didn’t build that!” point. But it’s the Network, not the textbook, that’s pushing a political agenda here. Finally, why is the role of cotton before 1861 relevant to events in the Gilded Age? It’s not. The Network wants the text to say that the Gilded Age’s improvements in the quality of life were due, not to free enterprise, but due to earlier government involvement and to OPPRESSION, of slaves and of Native Americans. That’s preposterous. Bogus, bogus, bogus.

(c) One text contains praise of capitalism:

The capitalist economic system of the United States helped spur industrial growth. In capitalism, individuals and businesses own property and decide how to use it. The people—not the government—control capital, which includes the buildings, land, machines, money, and other items used to create wealth.

Again, the Network insists on a “You didn’t build that” approach:

This passage ignores a very important dimension of American economic development after the Revolution: the argument, developed by Alexander Hamilton, that government power is needed to foster development in an active way, including projects that are beyond private capital’s reach. The declarative statement that “people – not the government – control capital” seems to dismiss even the possibility of this more complicated relationship between individuals, the government and capital. In addition, the debate over public regulation of both individual and corporate enterprise remains an active subject of contention in American economic and legal life to the present day. Students should have a context for understanding that debate.

Let’s look carefully at what the text is saying. Capitalism “helped spur industrial growth.” It doesn’t say that capitalism was solely responsible for growth. Second, it says that our economic system allows people and businesses to own property and decide how to use it. Is the Network denying that? Finally, the text says that the people rather than the government control capital. Again, isn’t that true? The contrast is with socialism, which puts government in control of property and centralizes decision-making. I don’t read the passage as denying the possibility of regulation or of public projects. This, moreover, is a middle-school U.S. history textbook that ends its coverage in 1877. There were important public works projects within its time frame, and important issues about the proper role of government—the Hamilton/Jefferson debate, Andrew Jackson’s assault on the Bank of the United States, Henry Clay’s “American system”—all of which receive coverage in the book. But the main expansion of the government’s role occurs after 1877, outside the frame of coverage of the book. Asking it to do more than it already does on this score is bogus.

(d) One government text says, to introduce its discussion of taxation,

In the words of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., taxes are ‘what we pay for civilized society.’ Society does not appear to be much more civilized today than it was when Justice Holmes made that observation in 1927. However, ‘what we pay’ has certainly gone up.

Ah! But society is much more civiilzed today, says the Network:

The text neglects to mention that defenders of increased taxation for an expanded safety net would respond that programs adopted since 1927 such as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act have produced such ‘civilized’ benefits as a drastic reduction of poverty and economic insecurity among the elderly, children, and the population at large, and improved and more equal access to health care.

The text should be insisting on the benefits of the welfare state, and trumpeting Obamacare! (I thought Obamacare was going to lower costs, by the way, not justify increased taxation in the decades since 1927. But, whatever.) Again, it’s the Network that’s trying to politicize things. The points they raise are in any event irrelevant to the point the book is introducing, which is that income tax rates have skyrocketed from a top rate of 7% when the tax was introduced. Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are financed separately; in theory, at least, they have no bearing on income tax rates. Obamacare hasn’t even been fully implemented yet; it’s no explanation for the increase in the tax burden that’s taken place over the past century. The Network’s objection is completely bogus.

(e) The Network complains about a cartoon—a cartoon!—implying that taxes are high and that people don’t like paying them:

The text also includes an ideologically slanted cartoon. [“Gibbs, I subtracted your federal, state and social security taxes and medical from your paycheck, and you owe the firm $50.” The caption for the cartoon reads: “Taxes fund public programs and services, but some question the need for that spending and criticize the burden those taxes place on taxpayers. What comment does this cartoon make?”]

What’s Wrong? The text gives students the impression that Americans are very heavily taxed without placing this information in historical or cross-national context. For instance, the text could have mentioned that according to the Congressional Budget Office in 2011, federal taxes as a percentage of the GDP were at their lowest rate since 1950. The text might also have mentioned that the United States has the lowest corporate tax burden of any member nation of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The use of this cartoon is also unbalanced because the text provides no counterbalancing illustration suggesting that excessively low taxes might lead to economic insecurity and poverty, or critical of the lack of an adequate safety net for low-income Americans.

The Network evidently has no sense of humor. Instead of including a cartoon that’s making a joke, the text should have told students that taxes in the United States are low by historic and international standards. The Network’s “facts” are incorrect; federal taxes as a percentage of GDP sank in the aftermath of the economic crisis, but have rebounded, and are nearly as high as they were in 1942! And, we have the highest corporate tax rate in the OECD; we collect less revenue from it than the other members because (a) Congress enacts loopholes to benefit campaign contributors and (b) our high rate encourages firms to structure their earning to avoid taxation—and even to shift operations and ownership overseas. I’m inclined to count this complaint trivial, but it shows how far the Network is willing to go to insist that textbooks ought to reflect Democratic talking points. Bogus.

5. “Several world geography and history textbooks suffer from an incomplete – and often inaccurate – account of religions other than Christianity.”

Here, the Network is on firmer ground. Geographers and historians aren’t specialists in religion or philosophy, and they often oversimplify or make mistakes. Consider some particular complaints:

(a) In describing Buddhism’s second Noble Truth, one text says, “Selfishness is the cause of suffering,” and later calls it “a cause of suffering.” The Network says the first is wrong and the second misleading, since, “According to the Buddha, the cause of suffering is not selfishness but desire; selfishness is only one form of desire.” The Pali term is tanha, which is usually translated as desire, selfish desire, or craving. It’s not far from the Biblical term ‘coveting.’ Though the text’s claim isn’t without any basis—selfish desire is an acceptable translation—selfishness by itself isn’t a very good rendering. I consider the complaint reasonable.

(b) Another book says, “Hindus are strict vegetarians.” Not true, says the Network, and they’re right. Some Hindu darshanas prohibit meat-eating, but others don’t. Reasonable.

(c) A Teachers’ Edition states, “All three religions [Judaism, Christianity, Islam] see Jesus as an important prophet, but only Christians see him as the messiah, or expected leader and savior.” Not so, the Network observes; most Jews do not think of Jesus as a prophet. That’s right; the complaint is reasonable.

(d) The Network criticizes one book for its imbalance: “The lesson on the history of Southwest Asia devotes only six sentences to Judaism’s origins and does not include a discussion of the Diaspora. By contrast, the lesson devotes two pages to Islam and its spread.” Their objection: “This is not adequate attention to the important events surrounding the history of the Jewish faith tradition and culture.” In a history book I think this choice would be sensible; the spread of Islam dominated the history of a substantial portion of the world for centuries, and included the many wars mentioned in an earlier post in this series. In a book on world cultures and geography, however, it seems less defensible. Judaism is the leading religion only in Israel, so, even for such a book, one could argue, its spread deserves less attention than the spread of Islam. But it’s not clear whether that argument is decisive. I count this one debatable.

(e) “Coverage of key Christian concepts and historical events are lacking in a few textbooks, often due to the assumption that all students are Christians and familiar with Christian events and doctrine.” The books generally don’t define such terms as ‘Protestant,’ ‘Catholic,’ ‘Orthodox,’ though they do define ‘Sunni,’ ‘Shi’ite,’ etc. The Network observes:

Whereas the lesson on Southwest Asia states: “The teachings of Jesus led to the rise of Christianity,” it does not explain what those teachings were or how Christianity spread. In contrast, the authors devote a full page to the teachings of Muhammad, Muslim practices (the Five Pillars), and the spread of Islam.

What’s Wrong? Given the increasing number of Texas students who come from outside the Christian tradition, textbooks should not assume that readers are familiar with what Christianity is and how it spread.

I’m amused that the Network demands more discussion of Christianity; I suspect the authors were worried that such discussion would have led to the opposite complaint. And the authors undoubtedly thought, correctly, that the percentage of Christians in their intended audience would be much higher than the percentage of Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists, etc. But it’s a fair point. Even Christian students often have a sketchy conception of the teachings and history of their own religion. And those with other religious beliefs, or with no religious background at all, are likely to have even less exposure to the history and teachings of Christianity. So, I consider this objection reasonable.

4. “All of the world geography textbooks inaccurately downplay the role that conquest played in the spread of Christianity.”

See what’s happening here? According to the Texas Freedom Network, textbooks aren’t allowed to say that Islam has been spread primarily through conquest, even though that’s true. They are required to say that Christianity has been spread primarily by conquest, even though that’s false. The narrative is supposed to be that Islam is good and Christianity is bad. Anything that deviates from that line should be kept out of the books that children will be assigned to read.

Here’s the kind of thing the offending texts say:

When Europeans arrived, they brought Christianity with them and spread it among the indigenous people. Over time, Christianity became the main religion in Latin America.

Priests came to Mexico to convert Native Americans to the Roman Catholic religion. The Church became an important part of life in the new colony. Churches were built in the centers of towns and cities, and church officials became leaders in the colony.

The Spanish brought their language and Catholic religion, both of which dominate modern Mexico.

These claims are entirely true. So, what’s the problem? The Network explains:

The Christianization of the indigenous peoples of the Americas was most decidedly not benign. These descriptions provide a distorted picture of the spread of Christianity. An accurate account must include information about the forced conversion of native peoples and the often-systematic destruction of indigenous religious institutions and practices.

This might be reasonable, if the texts gave a detailed account of the Christianization of Latin America that omitted any mention of violence. But they don’t give a detailed account. It’s hard to see why they would have to, unless it’s to support the “Western Civilization is evil” position of the Network.

Recall that these are geography books, not history books, and not histories of Latin America. The complaint is bogus.

We’ve been seeing a pattern: the Texas Freedom Network denounces textbooks, not for saying things that are false, but for declining to give their preferred narrative. They attack books for giving arguments on the other side of their own political positions.

This is clear from their treatment of World History textbooks. Let’s look at their next complaint:

3. “Several world history and world geography textbooks include biased statements that inappropriately portray Islam and Muslims negatively.”

(a) One text says, “Much of the violence you read or hear about in the Middle East is related to a jihad.” The Network cries foul: “This broad charge effectively blames Islam for a very complex cycle of violence and counter-violence, a cycle driven by a host of factors (e.g., natural resources, population pressures) besides radical Islam.” But the text says that much of the violence relates tojihad. My objection would be that ‘relates to’ is vague; how does it relate? Events and patterns of events, however, can easily relate to many different things; saying that much violence relates to jihad doesn’t in any way deny that other factors are at work as well. What the text says is true. It seems the Network wants the texts to whitewash Islam’s role in promoting violence. The complaint is bogus.

(b) One text says, “The spread of international terrorism is an outgrowth of Islamic fundamentalism which opposes Western political and cultural influences and Western ideology.” The Network objects: “Not all international terrorism is an outgrowth of Islamic fundamentalism; for example, ETA in Spain and the Irish Republican Army are unrelated to Islamic fundamentalism.” But the ETA and the IRA aren’t international in anything like the same sense. Bogus.

(c) The same text speaks of the Middle East and North Africa as being “occupied” by Muslims. The Network says “the use of loaded terms like ‘occupied’ makes little sense when discussing the Middle Ages, when the population of those regions were by and large Muslim themselves.” I wish the same sensitivity were at work when people use the term to refer to Gaza or the West Bank! Still, I rate this complaint reasonable.

(d) The Network reports that the text maintains that “Islam synthesized, stored, and annotated Classical Greek and Roman learning but did not do much to add to it,” and objects that “in nearly every instance the ‘original’ scientist whose work inspired the scientist described is identified, which serves to minimize the contribution of Islamic scholarship.” It’s hard to evaluate this objection without looking in detail at each figure discussed and the particulars of the discussion. Some Islamic scholars were highly original; others made relatively minor contributions, serving mostly to transmit Greek or Indian ideas. So, let’s call this one debatable.

(e) Another book points out that “In the centuries after Muhammad’s death, Muslims spread their religion by conquest. Islamic rulers took control of Southwest Asia, Central Asia, North Africa, and parts of India and Spain.” That’s uncontroversially true, even if politically incorrect. The Network holds, “This is a half-truth. While in this period Islam did spread in part by conquest, it was also taken to many regions (for instance, Sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia) by traders and missionaries, not by conquest.” But notice that the book says nothing about Sub-Saharan Africa or those other parts of Asia (Indonesia, for example). ‘Half-true’ here appears to mean ‘true, but leaving out what we’d prefer they talk about.’ Islam spread by many means, not least offering people with little wealth a vast reduction in taxes. But the history of conquest is undeniable: